No Sauce Required: How to Survive the Election Apocalypse

The election survival plan is designed to help you wade through the travesty, disappointment and lack of drama that is this Saturday. Allow me to present my six point plan of action, guaranteed to get you to the polling booths without breaking down and crying.

I call this six pillar plan Our Plan – Real Solutions for Surviving A Boatload of Electoral Pain. A plan, written by me, to help you plan how to plan your vote. It’s a plan for you and me: it’s our plan.

The Leader
Sexy in stature, Tony Abbott has the great pleasure of, according to almost all news polls, being the preferred PM and is the leader of the preferred party to win the election. The T-man is well known for being weirdly fit, saying things like “sex appeal” and “my daughters are good looking”.

The Policy
In terms of party policy, the Liberal Party want to scrap the NBN (super-fast internet, currently being rolled out by the ALP, see below), and implement their own internet. Their claim is that it will be “(implemented) faster and be cheaper”. In actual fact, the internet that the Liberals will roll out, if elected, will be slower than most of the rest of the world. They’ve also introduced a lot of workplace policies, such as more incentive (read: money) to employers who hold onto their employees for a long time.

Other than that, Abbott and the Liberals are adamant they will scrap the carbon tax (which is amazing news for big business), make roads better (rather than public transport), STOP THE FACKIN BOATS, and create two million new jobs.

What to take from the Liberal PartyHistorically, the Liberals are pretty good at dealing with money. Liberals tend to be fairly effective in handing expenses, involving moderately hard line capitalist systems. If you make an effort to look at their campaign, a lot of the time they capitalise on the fact that they are great with money, unlike Labor.

That being said, they’re relatively horrendous at whatever else that isn’t to do with economics.

The Leader
I like to call him Kevin 'Wet Mouth' Rudd. Seriously, have you seen the amount that man licks his lips? It’s disgusting.

Otherwise known as the lesser of two evils, a lot of people will be voting for KRudd and the ALP this year in the hope that the centre-left will prevail rather than the centre-right.

The Party
The Labour party have been in charge for some six years, and have changed leadership hands three times (Rudd-Gillard-Rudd), and there were something like 500 leadership spills (totally accurate numbers).

In their reign, Labor has introduced policies like a new disability care scheme (NDIS), apologised to indigenous Australians for the stolen generation; introduced the carbon tax (which is now apparently being scrapped no matter who wins); and put more money in schools.

They have also introduced the National Broadband Network (NBN), which would provide super, super fast internet allowing for people to legally download films in a matter of seconds. And help business efficiency. But mostly the downloads thing.

What to take from the Labor Party
The Labor party recently came under some fire after introducing a hard line policy on asylum seekers – after maintaining the fact that they would never take a hard line policy on “stopping the boats”.

87% of bills passed by Labor have been unopposed by The Opposition. This could be read in one of two ways: one, that Labor has great, unopposable policies, or two; that Liberals and the Labor are becoming tragically similar to each other.

Ultimate party line: “We know we’re not very trustworthy, but it’s us or them. And we’re clearly the better of two bad things. So …”

Things that happened over the past four weeks

1. “We have a six point plan.”

This poor guy. I mean, I feel sorry for him, but he’s an idiot. The member for Greenway, Jaymes Diaz cold not, for the life of him, remember what his party policies were. Whoops.

2. “DOES THIS GUY EVER SHUT UP?”

The phrase that shocked the nation, the big T-Abbs said this to KRudd during the second debate. The great thing about this was that I don’t think it actually changed the vote of anyone: those who like Abbott thought it was great, those who like Rudd thought it was malicious.

At the same incredible controversial debate, the woman who did the make-up for Kevin and Tony decided that Tony was by far the greater man. Of course, this hot gossip which was the opinion of one woman made the news, and unearthed a lot of Kevin’s “bad moments” such as that one video where he just sits around swearing.

4. For the third week in a row, WHAT IS WITH THIS PUNK ROCK MUSIC VIDEO THAT POLITICIANS TOOK PART IN.

5. When Rudd and Abbott are within 500cm of each other or are touching.

I don’t know about you, but it freaks me out. It’s something that should only happen in a parallel universe where the sky is purple.

OH MY GOD IT'S HAPPENED THE SKY IS PURPLE

6. Clive Palmer

If I had to pick my favourite part of the election campaign, I wouldn’t be able to because there are too many good moments where Clive Palmer exists.

A weird amount of people have no idea what to do when they actually vote. I had no idea what to do until about a month ago. Here’s my comprehensive guide.

The night before
Realise that no matter who you choose tomorrow, there probably won’t be an incredible (read: there will be no dictatorship) change to anything at all.

At this point it is acceptable to cry, change your vote, wonder whether this is real life (or are you living in the world of The Truman Show?), or whether you can count properly. My recommendation: practice writing the numbers 0-9 to make sure that they look legible.

On the day
Unlike rich people at a formal event, the election booth does not judge you on the way you dress. Thus, it is advisable you dress comfortably, yet confidently. You don’t want party members attacking you right before you hit the polls. My personal strategy is a simple yet deceitful one: for any party member that comes up to you, smile and say, “I’m voting for you!” and keep walking.

Alternatively, attend the polling booths with a mouth full of water. When a party member tries to attack you, turn, smile and dribble profusely.

The Green SlipWhen you actually get to the booths, make sure you number every box on the green slip and do not draw any penises.

While cartoon penises make for some extraordinary humour, it means that your vote won’t be counted. You also will want to number every single box, number 1 being your most favourite candidate, and the last number being your least favourite. So, if you really don't like the Animal Justice Party, just put them last. And no penis.

The 1.2 Metre Long White SlipIn glorious 6 pt print, the white piece of paper is for the senate. These are the nannies of the House of Representatives, and the voting system is a bit different. You can vote above the line, which means you’d just vote for one of your favourite candidates. If your selected candidate doesn’t get through, they pass their votes onto their next favourite.

But that’s just one half of the game. If you’re a serious-into-politics-and-don’t-trust-anyone-except-yourself kind of person, you’ll want to vote below the line. This means that you personally pick where your votes go if your first preference doesn’t get through to the senate. If your second preference doesn’t get through, it’ll go to your number three, and so on. The only problem with this is that there are a whopping 100-something senate candidates to pick from, so you’re guaranteed to spend a good three hours at the polling booth, unsure if you’ve written the number 44 twice. So try not to make a mistake.

After you vote
Just try not to think about it. There will be a handful of you who are comfortable with your vote, but there’ll also be plenty who are unsure post-voting. My personal plan is to roll around for the rest of the day, moaning.

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